I've noticed an increase in forum debate about the validity of transferring the credibility of ABX from the physical domain to perception testing. I'm wondering if anyone has found a way past this issue?

The purpose of blind testing is to subtract subjectivity from the effect of - for instance - a drug trial: to assess a medication's impact on a subject's physiology with interference from their psychology. But what about when the purpose of a test is subjective perception? How do we then subtract the effect of the method to arrive at a meaningful outcome?

While we would like to remove expectation bias from the equation, if the conditions under which this is done also change the perceptive state of the listener, the test is invalidated as surely as they would be by tissue sample contamination.

Recent large scale public experiments by Lotto Labs (http://www.lottolab.org/) demonstrated that perception acuity is dramatically altered by test conditions: for instance, that time contraction/dilation effects are experienced when exposed to colour fields. In one experiment, two groups were asked to perform an identical fine-grained visual acuity test. One group was pre-emptively 'manipulated' by filling in a questionnaire designed to lower their self-esteem. This 'less confident' group consistently performed worse on the test that the unmanipulated one: their acuity was significantly impaired by a subtle psychological 'tweak' that wasn't even in effect during the test.

It seems undeniable that the much grosser differences between the mental states of sighted and 'blind' listening - considered generously - cast serious doubt on the results thus obtained.

The harder line is that blind perception tests are a fundamental misappropriation of methodology. In psychology it's axiomatic that for many experiments the subject must be unaware of the nature of the test (see Milgram). If a normalised state is not cunningly contrived, results are at best only indicative of what a subject thinks they should do; at worst, entirely invalid.

Probing hearing, the point is that a test must not change the mental state of the listener.

The contrast between outcomes of sighted and listening tests is as stark as those demonstrating suggestibility (see McGurk), but giving too much credence to such an intrinsically unsound experimental approach (not spotting this difficulty) does no favours to our credibility at all.

The only way past the dilemma seems to be direct mechanical examination of the mind during 'normal' listening to explore why the experiences of sighted and unsighted listening differ. This seems to be an interesting question.

In the meantime, the idea that - despite the method problem - results from blind ABX are valid is at least supported by the majority of data derived from home testing, Audio DiffMaker et al, so we needn't get hung up on it.

It's best to be careful drawing conclusions from measured 'brain response' (neural imaging) . One of the 2012 Ig Nobel prize winners illustrates the point

QUOTE

NEUROSCIENCE PRIZE: Craig Bennett, Abigail Baird, Michael Miller, and George Wolford [USA], for demonstrating that brain researchers, by using complicated instruments and simple statistics, can see meaningful brain activity anywhere — even in a dead salmon.

Any why, pray tell, would you claim 'placebo is irrelevant' to brain response. The placebo effect (and expectations bias) ARE brain responses. The point is that 'brain responses' are not perfect correlates of objective reality. Just because the brain registers a 'difference' doesn't mean one exists in fact.